exterior light

[Randy Johnson]

I like a well selected HDR on a sky object to add extra highlights and reflections.
/Randy

[Tatra Tero]

with gi ,or without??

second there is two type of sky 1- object-scene-sky

2- object-sky-create sky

wich one of theme

[Randy Johnson]

Yes GI.
Yes AO as well.
One sky at a time but do two multi-pass renders and Mix them to your liking in Photoshop.
/Randy

[Adam Trachtenberg]

There is no “best” solution — just different tools to achieve different looks. One way to go about it is with pure lighting (no GI). In that respect you can use an infinite light to represent the sun and any number of fill lights to represent ambient illumination. You can also supplement that with the environment object’s ambient setting (but a little goes a long way).

Or you can use the above in combination with GI or GI/HDRI.

Or you can use GI/HDRI alone….

Or in combination with ambient occlusion….

Personally I prefer not to use the built-in sky system as I find it takes away too much control.

If you use lights, it’s generally a good idea to use a warm color for the sun light and bluish colors for fill lights. Not a bad idea to add a subtle bluish tint to shadows, too.